In their high school sports days, the kids used to call nearby Winchester Losechester.
But the town, with its pretty river features, often drew us in for walks and a few restaurants.
Most recently, I was captured by this mural in the lobby of the town’s public library. The piece has the telltale signs of a Works Progress painting, almost like the one we loved in San Francisco’s Coit Tower. But I worried that it would be newly considered offensive with its depiction of Europeans meeting Native Americans.
As it turns out, the library offers what seems like a worthy attempt to present the work in context: “While the painting my not be historically accurate in every detail,” an accompanying sign notes, “the work depicts a myth and a memory in a solemn, classical manner.”
It’s the kind of qualifier sorely missing from the debate over controversial statues and building names.
JOH NEJHE Blog 